Morning in Fangmist
The mist clung thicker than usual that morning, as though the mountain itself wanted to hide what had happened in the pits. The Serpent Hall's banners drooped damply, their green calligraphy bleeding faintly down the silk. Training bells rang, but their sound was muffled, trapped by the fog.
Disciples gathered in the training grounds, voices buzzing with rumor.
The boy bitten in the ninth pit.
The cripple who should have died.
The one with no jade tag.
Rumors in the Serpent Hall were venom themselves—circulating, spreading, killing reputations long before they could grow.
Lu Chen was loudest of all. His cronies clustered near him, snickering on cue. He slapped his thigh, mimicking Shen Lian's collapse. "Like a sack of wet rice! Did you see? The serpent breathed and the boy folded. I hear they left him in the cold room. He'll come out a ghost or soup—if he comes out at all!"
A ripple of laughter moved across the courtyard, though many disciples glanced nervously toward the path leading from the cold rooms.
Su Rou sat in a corner with her ledger scroll, her brush trembling. She copied names but her eyes never strayed far from that path. She had written "Shen Lian" in her records. A name she shouldn't have given. A name that might already be cursed.
⸻
Return of the Nameless
By the time the fog began to thin, the door of the cold room groaned open.
A figure stepped out.
Shen Lian.
Pale, gaunt, his robe clinging damply to his frame. But his eyes—those dull gray stones from before—now gleamed faintly, slit pupils flashing when the light touched them.
The courtyard fell silent. Even the hiss of venom arts being practiced stilled.
Lu Chen blinked, then barked a laugh too loud, too forced. "Ah. The cripple survives. What is he now? Poison-drunk? Snake-spat? Come, Shen Lian—show us your fangs!"
Shen Lian tilted his head. His lips curved faintly, not in mockery, not in anger, but in something quieter: disbelief at himself. "You want to see?"
Before Lu Chen could reply, Shen Lian moved.
It wasn't fast. It wasn't elegant. His hand brushed Lu Chen's wrist—just a touch.
And Lu Chen's body convulsed. His qi tore free of him, sucked like smoke from a candle. His knees buckled, his eyes bulged.
Shen Lian felt it pour into him. The serpent's venom inside his veins hissed with delight as the black seed in his dantian pulsed. Power rushed in, filling cracks long thought dead. Memories spilled over him—Lu Chen practicing a venom palm, Lu Chen sneaking wine, Lu Chen's shame when his father called him weak.
Shen Lian staggered, gasping, drunk on it. The qi didn't feel foreign—it felt as if it had always been his.
When he let go, Lu Chen collapsed, gray-faced, gasping like a fish pulled from water. Not dead. But empty.
The courtyard stared in horrified silence.
Shen Lian looked down at his trembling hand. The whispers coiled through him, soft and hungry.
More… more…
And for the first time in his life, he didn't feel broken. He felt complete.
⸻
Escalation
"Monster!" a disciple shouted.
Another spat, "He's practicing a forbidden art!"
Three inner disciples stepped forward, robes marked with green sashes, venom gourd-charms hanging from their belts. They formed a loose triangle around him, faces sharp with hostility and fear.
"Cripple," one sneered. "Let's see how your stolen strength fares against true cultivation."
Shen Lian's lips twitched. He didn't move as they struck.
The first lunged with Serpent Fang Palm, his qi forming a venomous strike. Shen Lian caught the wrist, instinct guiding him more than thought. Power surged, and the boy's qi drained into him with terrifying ease. The disciple screamed, dropping to his knees as his hand withered, skin sagging gray.
The second circled behind, swinging a jade dagger. Shen Lian turned without thinking—his body moved as if someone else directed it. His palm struck the dagger's flat. Lu Chen's memory rose in him, and suddenly Shen Lian knew the Venom Palm Technique, channeling it perfectly. The jade hissed black and cracked.
The third disciple hesitated, his strike faltering. Shen Lian's eyes found him—gray irises now glowing faintly with that slit-pupil glimmer.
The boy froze.
Shen Lian didn't move forward. He didn't need to. The whisper in his dantian rippled outward, brushing the disciple's spirit like a serpent tasting prey. The boy dropped his weapon and fled.
Gasps filled the courtyard.
Half the disciples backed away. Half looked ready to pounce. All of them whispered the same word:
"Demonic."
⸻
The Inner Battle
Shen Lian stood in the center, chest heaving. He felt alive. He felt whole. Yet inside, something twisted.
The memories of those he drained—Lu Chen's voice, the inner disciple's fear, their skills—flashed through his mind. He almost couldn't tell which were his anymore.
And deeper still, the whisper pressed at him.
More. Take them all. They're yours. They are you.
His hands trembled. He could taste qi in the air like the scent of roasting meat to a starving man. Every disciple looked like prey.
His jaw clenched. He forced himself still.
Not mine, he thought. Not yet.
But the whisper only laughed, hollow and endless.
⸻
Eyes Above
From the balcony, Elder Mo Xuan watched with narrowed eyes. He leaned lazily against the railing, expression unreadable.
Beside him, Sect Master Hei Zong's face was pale. "That boy… he should have died. What is this?"
Mo Xuan's lips curved faintly. "Not death. A seed. A seed that grows best in blood and fear."
Hei Zong shivered. "This will bring disaster."
Mo Xuan's eyes never left Shen Lian. "Or fortune. The serpent chooses its vessel rarely. Do you not smell it? The old path blooms again."
Hei Zong spat, "You speak of curses."
Mo Xuan smiled thinly. "Curses… or destiny."
⸻
Aftermath
Su Rou ran to Shen Lian as the disciples parted around him like water. Her voice was low, urgent. "You fool, do you know what you've done? They'll brand you a heretic!"
Shen Lian looked at her, calm. "Then let them."
"You don't understand," she whispered fiercely. "Forbidden arts—if the Sect Master decrees it, they'll flay you alive. Burn your bones. Feed what's left to the pits!"
Shen Lian's smile was faint, almost kind. "Then I'll take them too. Pit, sect, heavens—everything. If that's what it takes not to be broken."
Su Rou's face blanched. "That's not cultivation. That's—"
Shen Lian leaned close, his voice low, trembling with both fear and exhilaration. "That's survival."
The courtyard watched, disciples whispering, fear rippling like snakes in tall grass. Some already imagined Shen Lian as a threat to be eliminated. Others, secretly, felt a shiver of awe.
And high above, Mo Xuan's soft laugh echoed through the hall like the hiss of a serpent shedding its skin.
⸻
Cliffhanger
That night, Shen Lian sat in the cold room again, alone. His veins burned with stolen qi. His hand still trembled with the memory of hunger.
In his dreams, the black seed split open. A single lotus petal unfurled inside his dantian, its edges sharp as blades.
And within it, voices sang.
Not just one.
Not just hunger.
But dozens.
All whispering at once.
We are you.
You are us.
Devour.
Shen Lian woke with a gasp, sweat chilling his skin.
He pressed a trembling hand against his chest, against the pulsing lotus inside him.
And he realized: every fight from now on would not just be against others. It would be against himself.